North Carolina Democrats are facing a brutal election that could see their worst results in more than a decade, according to the latest and last Civitas-John Locke Foundation poll of the 2022 election.
The poll, released two weeks before Election Day, shows Republican Ted Budd pulling away with a four-point lead.
The Trafalgar Group, also showed a 4-point advantage, and ECU showed a 6-point Budd advantage. Including the Locke poll, the Real Clear Politics polling average is now about 4 points.They may not sound like it, but those are huge margins for recent North Carolina’s U.S. State elections. Sen. Thom Tillis was first elected to the upper chamber in 2014 with a winning margin of 1.5% and re-elected in 2020 with a winning margin of 1.75%
Of 17 public polls released since this spring, Beasley has led in only two and none after Labor Day. A four-point victory for Budd would be larger than Trump’s N.C. victories in 2016 (3.6%) and 2020 (1.34%)
President Biden’s job approval has fallen to 38.4% in N.C., his lowest in the Locke poll since this spring. Biden was never going to stay at his Locke 2022 polling low of 33.3% in May, because some angry Democrats were always going to come home.
However, his current 38.4% job approval against 55.3% disapproval, with a majority (50.5%) strongly disapproving, is horrific for Democrats. Beasley would have to run a full 10 points ahead of her party’s president to win, a feat only accomplished a few times in the last century. This is nearly an impossibility for a candidate who is not already a very popular Senate incumbent.
At this time in the election cycle, don’t listen to what they “say” about a race.
Watch what they do.
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Republicans are now showing massive 6-point leads in both the legislative and congressional generic numbers. There is no way to sugarcoat it. These are beat-down numbers that will lead to GOP supermajorities in the General Assembly and to winning every congressional seat that was not heavily gerrymandered for Democratic victory by the Democrat-controlled state Supreme Court.
The Democrat N.C. Supreme Court imposed a map that they intended to guarantee a minimum of 6 Democrats and 7 Republicans with one swing seat in NC-13, where Republican Bo Hines and Democrat Wiley Nickel are currently battling. Democrats hoped they could work to an even 7-7 split. With these numbers, Republicans will win NC-13 and now have a realistic chance to win NC-1 too, which is currently held by retiring G.K. Butterfield and has been held by a Democrat for more than 100 years. The non-partisan Cook Political Report rates the seat as just +2 Democrat.
Continue Reading: https://www.carolinajournal.com/opinion/north-carolina-democrats-on-the-ropes/